That being said, in my first draft, something significant has to happen every ten-thousand words to drive the book forward. My books, written fast and furious, usually run about 80,000 words at the end of the first draft, and generally I add approximately 8,000 words to that in rewrites as I flesh out characters, scenes, and the plot. I absolutely think of myself as an artiste, but at the same time, I have realized the importance of the rhythm of writing. My writing has refined into a more business-like aspect, without, I hope, losing the artistic side of things. Do you think of yourself as an artiste or are you analyzing every aspect of your story for marketability? Has that changed from your early perspective? Let’s talk about the balance between the creative versus the business side of the industry. While I believe that everybody who writes a book is accomplished, financial prosperity is much harder to achieve. What I have come to better understand is how hard and how many people are striving to become successful writers. It is a combination of my mysteries, which there are two separate series, the Mainely Mystery series, and the Clay Wolfe Trap series, and my historical novels. My upcoming historical PI mystery, Velma Gone Awry, is a culmination of all of my writing that has come before. I’d like to think that my writing has become better. I have always loved learning new things and creating stories. When he is hired to find the young flapper daughter of a German businessman, life suddenly becomes much more complicated.I don’t believe that much has changed in how I think about writing over the course of my career. He enjoys his friends, a good book, jazz music, brown liquor, and a very simple life. Now, in his mid-thirties, 8 is a college educated man, a veteran of the Great War, jilted in love, and has his own private investigator business. She meant to change it to a real name at some point but never got around to it.

8 Ballo's mother was certain he was going to be born a girl, but when he comes out a boy, she writes down simply the number 8, as he has seven older siblings. Scott Fitzgerald, Coleman Hawkins, Bugsy Siegel, Babe Ruth, and many more as he tries to uncover why Velma went awry. The search will lead him to cross paths with Dorothy Parker, Zelda and F. Read full overviewĪward-winning author Matt Cost brings us back to Brooklyn in the Roaring '20s and introduces us to Hungarian PI, 8 Ballo, who is hired to find the daughter of a wealthy businessman. The search will lead him to cross paths with Dorothy Parker, Zelda a. Award-winning author Matt Cost brings us back to Brooklyn in the Roaring '20s and introduces us to Hungarian PI, 8 Ballo, who is hired to find the daughter of a wealthy businessman.

Velma Gone Awry by Matt Cost